Behind Closed Doors
by Mosteyn
Summary: A series of scenes and conversations that take place between Sybil and Tom and others in various bedrooms throughout their marriage. Its basically a series of snapshots of their life at different times. Start 1919 and aiming to take this one into the thirties if I don't run out of ideas. Now completely and utterly AU. Chapters 7 & 8 - Going Home
1. Chapter 1 Dublin, August 1919

**Dublin, August, 1919**

It was a hot, sultry Sunday afternoon. All the windows of their small flat in the smart district of Rathmines were open, although this simply allowed more noise that breeze to float through. Sybil and Tom were lying on their bed, both as bare as the day they were born.

They'd just made love in a rather leisurely fashion, it being far too hot for anything more energetic. Tom was lying on his back and staring at the ceiling, his mind empty for once, the sweat on his body starting to cool him a little. Sybil lay on her front, propped up on her arms and idly swinging her legs in the air. She'd piled her hair in an untidy knot on the top of her head, allowing what breeze there was to cool her neck. Stray tendrils were escaping and tickled her shoulder. She was humming softly to herself when she felt the back of his finger gently stroke her upper arm, so she turned to smile at him lazily.

"I thought you'd dozed off"

"Now that," he said as he smiled back, putting his hands behind his head and stretching like a panther, "would be very decadent. Sleeping on a Sunday afternoon…."

Sybil raised her eyebrows.

"And what we're doing isn't ?"

"Not for a good Catholic" he replied, grinning.

She rolled over onto her side to look at him properly.

"We couldn't do this at Downton. Can you imagine ? All those people milling about. Its funny, I suppose I grew up with it, but now I've lived here its made me realise how little real privacy I had."

"Surely the doors have locks ?"

"Yes, but if you locked yourself in your room then everyone would want to know why. And Mrs Hughes has copies of all the keys."

He raised his eyebrows at this and propped himself up on his elbows.

"You mean she could just walk in on you, even if you'd locked the door ?"

"Well, you'd have to leave the key in the lock I suppose… but if you were in a locked room in the middle of the afternoon with your husband you might as well have announced what you were doing at dinner. That's why I love it here. Its just us. No one knows what we're doing and no one particularly cares. I can get up and go and get a drink without needing to get dressed or even put on a dressing gown."

"You never do, though. You always put your dressing gown on, even when you are going to the bathroom"

Sybil mused on this.

"I suppose I do…even though I could, it doesn't seem quite right, wandering about with nothing on."

He grinned.

"That's your puritan Proddy heritage coming out. We Catholics have no such reservations about nakedness"

She raised an eyebrow and glanced down the length of his exposed body beside her.

"I've noticed….."

"I wish you would"

"What ?"

"Wander around naked"

"Tom !"

"What ? You've got a gorgeous body, Sybil, and I'd rather like it if I got to see it more often…."

"It just…. wouldn't feel right"

"So you're happy to be naked with me, like this, in our bedroom, but not anywhere else ? That makes no sense. You've been naked with me in practically every room of this flat."

Sybil blushed at the memory.

"That was different"

Tom looked at her quizzically.

"Why ?"

"Because…..we were…..Oh, I don't know. I can't explain. I think if I were to just wander around the flat naked it would spoil it."

"Spoil what ?"

She placed her hand on his chest and ran her fingers through the soft hairs on his abdomen.

"Well…. times like this…..it would make being naked ordinary, rather than ….. a bit….well…you know…." she gave him a naughty little grin. "And anyway I like being naked when I'm being naked with you"

He gave her a rather smug smile

"I'm glad to hear it"

She trailed her fingers up and down his chest, where he captured her hand and placed a kiss in her palm.

"Well, if it were up to me," he said mischievously, "you wouldn't have any clothes. I'd keep you naked all day long"

She looked up in mock horror

"But I'd get terribly cold !"

"No you wouldn't. I'd keep you warm..." he smirked, pulling her closer

"and I'd get dirty"

His smirk broadened into an evil grin.

"But I like it when you get dirty. Especially when you ..." at this point he leant over and whispered something in her ear that made her go a very fetching shade of pink. She gasped and pulled away

"Tom !"

"What ?" he laughed "You can't play the innocent with me, Missy..." he said, pulling her back down him and making her giggle as he started to kiss her neck.

"Anyway" she said, "I would need _some_ clothes"

"Alright, alright,... but only if I get to choose them"

"Huh ! You'll have me dressed up like a dancing girl in a harem….."

He smiled broadly at this, and she wondered if it was the memory of a certain swathe of blue silk that had come into his mind. She was therefore rather taken aback by what he said next.

"Seraglio"

"What ?"

"Its not called a harem - its a seraglio"

She rolled her eyes.

"Pedant…" she chided gently, leaning in to kiss his chest.

"If you were a dancing girl in a seraglio, that would make me some Eastern potentate, spending his life on silk cushions, surrounded by beautiful women waiting on his every need. I think I could cope with that"

She snorted.

"Or", she said, a provocative glint in her eye, "you'd most likely be a eunuch"

He sat up at this, grabbing her wrists and looking at her sternly as she tried to twist out of his grasp.

"Eunuch ? " he said, outraged, rolling her on her back and pushing her legs apart. She was still trying to escape, so he pinned her arms firmly over her head and looked down at her as she met his gaze with a haughty stare. "I really don't think so, milady…"

* * *

Some time later, when Tom had proved his point to his own (and Sybil's) satisfaction, they lay flushed and content in each others arms, so closshe could feel the sweat trickling on his skin.

"So what will happen when we do go back to Downton ?" he said, idly coiling a skein of her hair around his finger

"What do you mean ?"

"About….well…..sleeping arrangements"

"Usually they put married guests in one of the suites," she replied, nuzzling his chest with the tip of her nose, "but I rather like the idea of being back in my old room"

"So where will they put me ?" he asked, alarmed

"With me, silly...but you'll have to disappear into the dressing room early in the morning"

"Why ?"

"Otherwise you'll give Carson a headache over who'll bring the tray up"

He looked confused.

"What do you mean ?"

"Well, as a married woman I get to have breakfast in bed, like Mama. You, on the other hand, need to get up and dressed and go down for breakfast with the rest of the family"

His eyes widened in horror

"You wouldn't make me do that, would you ?"

She gave him a small smile and shrugged apologetically.

"Can't I just have some of your toast ?"


	2. Chapter 2 Downton, May 1920

**A/N:**Based on one of the spoilers that have come out for season three, but not one there has been a trailer for yet. I'm sure this is not what is going to happen, but I was just intrigued by the idea :-)

* * *

**Downton, May 1920**

As Sybil left the dining room, she shot her husband an anxious look, but he wasn't looking at her, frowning instead at his tightly clasped hands as they rested on the table. She was disappointed with Tom more than annoyed, but she'd always known this might happen, especially, as had been the case, he'd felt insulted.

Colonel Bradshaw was one of Robert's oldest cronies from the Boer war and a member of the old guard in more ways than one. Sybil quite frankly detested the man and never understood how her father could maintain a friendship with someone like him. He was a frequent visitor to Downton during her childhood, visits that she came to dread once she was old enough to join the adults for dinner. Her father used to joke that she was a bit of a favourite of the Colonel's, but the fifteen year old Sybil had hated the way he would make a beeline for her once he entered the drawing room, standing too close and forcing her to endure his particular stench of maleness, a mix of brandy and strong cigars and whatever concoction he used on his frightful moustache.

Finding him in the drawing room before dinner was no surprise; luckily he had no time to escape from his wife and come over to talk to them before they were lead through to the dining room. She did however have enough time to catch him looking curiously at Tom, as if trying to recall where he had heard his name before.

He continued to throw glances in Tom's direction throughout the first two courses. Then Sybil saw him lean across to her father

"Didn't you have a chauffeur called Branson ? Irish chap ? Whatever happened to him ?"

Robert stiffened and looked up at his mother in alarm. He had a feeling that the precarious edifice they had constructed to explain away his scruffy Irish son-in-law was about to come tumbling around their ears.

"Yes, I did", he replied, seeing no sense in denying it, even though the said former chauffeur was sat not ten feet away from him. "He went back to Ireland a while ago."

"Curious," muttered his friend, "that your daughter married someone of the same name"

"I believe its a common enough name in Ireland" Violet put in smoothly.

Colonel Bradshaw just nodded in assent and for a moment Robert thought they had got away with it. But then the Colonel turned his attention to Tom, asking him what he did in Dublin. On discovering he was a journalist, he proceeded to express some rather robust views on the troubles there and what punishment should be metered out to anyone suspected of being involved in insurrection. Tom, having just returned from investigating a recent riot in Limerick where the army had fired indiscriminately on an unarmed crowd, pointed out that these punishments often got out of hand, terrorising and killing the innocent.

"Nonsense. Fenian propaganda. I hope to goodness that isn't the sort of tripe you peddle in your paper, Mr Branson"

Sybil knew that was like a red rag to a bull for Tom and the exchange that followed came as no surprise. She also knew it would be Tom who got the blame for it. As she passed through the saloon as the ladies retired to the drawing room she briefly considered going to bed, but dismissed the idea immediately. If she was not present in the room, the guests would discuss her husband's behaviour more openly than if she were there. Her mother had waited for her just by the door.

"Chin up, darling," Cora said as she passed her.

Sybil made to join her sisters, but she was waylaid by the Dowager and summoned to sit beside her. She sighed, sensing she about to get the sharp edge of her grandmother's tongue. Her mother followed her and seated herself opposite, her hands firmly folded in her lap and her eyes protective.

Violet's expression was caustic and disapproving.

"Well, if that is how you conduct dinner conversation in Ireland then it would seem you have been living a very exciting life this past year"

"Granny…" Sybil began, but was not allowed the luxury of finishing

"I had no idea that life in Dublin was like the living in the Wild West. I'd always heard it was a reasonably civilised place"

Sybil looked up at her mother, who raised her eyes imperceptibly heavenward.

"It's perfectly civilised, Granny."

Violet seemed amused.

"Oh ? Then the Irish seem to have a different definition of the word civilised than the one in common currency" she said.

Sybil took a deep breath.

"You can't blame Tom for all of that, Granny. He was being insulted."

Cora looked up briefly to make sure the Colonel's wife was out of earshot. She could tell her daughter was starting to get worked up.

"You mustn't get upset, darling" she said "its not good for the baby"

"I'm not getting upset" Sybil said tightly.

"Getting upset seems to be a Branson family trait" commented Violet into her brandy glass

"And with good cause ! I don't understand why you're blaming Tom when the Colonel…."

"Colonel Bradshaw is a guest in this house, Sybil."

"And that means he can say what he likes ?"

"Mama, Sybil needs…"

"What Sybil needs is to learn to manage that husband of hers" said Violet shortly.

"_Manage_ him ? Granny, I have no wish to manage him. That's not what our marriage is like."

"Evidently…" observed Violet drily "…..but then, what do I know about these _modern_ marriages…."

Sybil opened her mouth to retort, but she was interrupted by her mother.

"Darling, you haven't really had a chance to catch up with your sisters yet - why don't you go and talk to them ? "

Sybil nodded.

"I think that is a good idea", she said, glowering at her grandmother.

She moved over to where Mary was sitting with Edith, aware of the covert pitying glances of the other female guests as she passed them in their small groups. Only Isobel smiled at her encouragingly.

"Are you alright, darling ?"

"Please don't say anything, Mary."

"I wasn't going to"

"I don't know why Papa let it get that far." said Sybil, a little bitterly "It was obvious he was being provoked"

Mary raised an eyebrow at her sister's perception of the evening's events. She was sure that most of the other dinner guests would not agree with her.

Further discussion was put to an end by the arrival of the gentlemen. Sybil looked expectantly as they filed in, but her husband was not among them. Here eyes widened with alarm.

"Where's Tom ?" she asked of Matthew as he came to join them.

Matthew looked rather sheepish.

"Er….He excused himself as soon as the ladies withdrew. I think he said something about going upstairs."

She got up immediately and gathered up her shawl.

"I'd better go and find him," she muttered "…goodnight." And without saying a word to anyone else she slipped out of the drawing room.

"Goodnight" repeated her sisters to her retreating back. Edith sighed and glanced at her father, obviously discussing his son-in-law's behaviour with their mother with evident disgust.

"Poor Sybil. Papa is furious."

Matthew nodded ruefully.

"I feel sorry for Branson. He's in an awkward position and Colonel Bradshaw was definitely trying to get a rise out of him."

Mary looked up at him in surprise.

"You don't think that debacle was his fault ?"

"I'm not saying that. Of course he shouldn't have lost his temper, but ….."

"There's no but, Matthew. Our people don't behave like that"

"But he isn't one of your people…."

Mary looked up in surprise.

"You don't count yourself as one of us ?"

Matthew realised his mistake too late and was casting around for a suitable explanation when he was saved by two of Robert's friends joining them. But he had a feeling Mary had noted that comment and he would be called to account for it later on.

* * *

Sybil opened the door to their bedroom slowly, not at all sure what she was going to find. The room was in darkness, but she could make out a shape on the far side of the bed. Tom was lying with his back to the door. He didn't say anything as she slipped into the room, so she quietly made her way to sit down behind him and switched on the bedside lamp. His evening suit lay thrown in a heap on a chair on the far side of the bed, the trousers slung over the back and one arm of the shirt trailing on the floor. He's forgone his pyjama jacket as he was wont to at home, so she could feel the familiar warmth of his skin through her thin glove as she gently placed a hand on his ribcage.

"Tom ?"

She thought she heard him momentarily catch his breath, but he said nothing and sharply pulled away from her touch.

She gave a dispirited sigh, replacing her hand in her lap when he said

"If you're going to scold me, can you do it tomorrow ? I'm not in the mood right now"

"I wasn't going to scold you"

He shifted slightly, then turned over on his back to look at her, a little shamefaced.

"I'm sorry for snapping at you. I shouldn't have done that."

She sighed and got up off the bed.

"It would have been best if you'd not said any of it" she said sadly, walking round to the end of the bed and taking off her shoes.

He frowned at this and sat up. His voice took on a steely edge and even in the shadows thrown by the lamplight she could see his jaw tense.

"Well, I'm sorry if I embarrassed you in front of your family, but I am not sorry about what I said to that bastard….."

"You know, sometimes its best to let these things go"

"What, just sit there and let him insult us ? "

"It might have been better in the long run if you had"

"I'm sorry ?"

"Well, what did it achieve ?" she said, exasperated. "You just confirmed what everyone was thinking of you"

"And what was that ?" he asked, nastily

She deliberately ignored the question; they both knew the answer and she refused to remind him of it.

"Dinner was not the place, Tom. You've been in service, you do know when to hold your tongue."

"_Hold my tongue_ ?" he repeated, incredulous. "You think I should have behaved like a _servant_ ? What would you rather I had done ? Just shut up and not answer my betters back ?"

"In this instance, it might have been advisable !" she said irritably

"What ?! I don't believe this…" he muttered under his breath, throwing himself out of bed to march round to face her.

"So basically you think that that bastard can say what he likes about me and my kind, and I shouldn't defend myself ? Why ? Because I was born in a Dublin slum, as your sister so _kindly_ put it, and not somewhere like this ?" He flung his arm out to take in the bedroom "Is that it ?" he demanded.

Her eyes flew wide as she gasped in shock at this accusation.

"How can you _possibly_ say that ! You know perfectly well that's not what I think ! God, Tom, sometimes you can be such a ..a….." she breathed in heavily and shook her head at him. "The man was an idiot, everyone round the table could see that. If you'd not pushed him….."

He gave a short laugh with that sardonic, sideways smirk that warned her that he was about to become blunt to the point of unpleasantness.

"Oh so this is all my fault now, is it ? You're my wife, Sybil - I thought I could count on you being on my side." he said coldly

Her head came up at this.

"I _am_ on your side !"

"Well, it didn't seem like it," he muttered, turning away from her.

Sybil was furious. She grabbed him by the arm and pulled him round to face her with all the strength she could muster.

"You're accusing me of being disloyal ? After all I've done ? After I left everything behind for you ? I came to Ireland to be with you, Tom, I've shared your bed for a year and I'm carrying your child. What more do I have to do to prove my loyalty to you ?!" she said, her voice rising in frustration

"You could have backed me up !"

"How ? Did you want me to start yelling across the dinner table as well ? Where would that have got us ?"

"I was not yelling !"

"I think most people around the table would disagree with you"

He gave a short, dismissive laugh and turned away from her again.

"You're not going to win them round by behaving like that, Tom"

He turned sharply back to look at her, his eyes icy.

"So now I don't know how to behave ? I see. Well, I'm sorry about that. If you wanted someone who behaved _properly_, perhaps you should have married a gentleman, and not - what did he call me ? - oh yes, I remember - _a grubby little chauffeur_ !" he said, jabbing an angry finger at her.

"And if you wanted someone who brawls like a fishwife then maybe you should have married someone from the docks !" she spat back at him

They stared at each other angrily, both breathing heavily and each painfully aware they had somehow wandered too close to the edge and if they weren't careful words would be said that would send things plummeting over a cliff.

It was Tom who backed down first. His anger dissipated; he put his hands on his hips and turned away from her. She could see his shoulders still heaving as he inhaled great gulps of air to calm himself down.

"You know that's never been what I wanted."

She heard him shift his weight and sigh.

"It's not what I want either." she whispered

He ran a hand through his hair and turned back to her, taking a deep breath

"Sometimes….." he stopped, unwilling to continue, "…sometimes I worry that one day you'll decide this is all too hard for you and you'll leave me and come back here."

He suddenly looked so much younger. His habit of being so brutally honest, of laying his vulnerabilities bare for her to do what she would with them still threw her, even after all this time. She took a few steps closer to him.

"We made each other a promise, Tom. For better or for worse. I meant it."

"So did I"

She leant into him instinctively at the same time he pulled her into an embrace and she let him hold her for a while, as the rythymn of the rise and fall of his chest calmed her. He had been honest; he deserved the same from her. She swallowed hard, gathering the courage to make her own confession.

"I worry too"

"What, that you'll leave me ?" he pulled away to look at her in shock.

She looked up him, alarmed, and shook her head.

"No ! No, not at all..….But you see, you waited so long for me that I worry ….." he could see her struggling to finish what she had decided to say "I worry that you'll find me a disappointment and…. you'll think I wasn't worth the wait" her last words came tumbling out in a rush as she looked back down at the floor.

He just blinked at her several times. It had never once occurred to him that Sybil might think that she could fall so far short of his expectations. The idea that he should ever find her wanting seemed preposterous to him. He took her face in his hands, gently raising it so he could look at her properly.

"If I'd had to wait all my life for the last year it would have been worth it."

She gave him a grateful, hesitant smile and covered his hands with her own, gently stroking them with her thumbs.

"I know this is hard for you, but its only for the rest of this week. Then we can go home."

He could have cried with relief when she referred to Dublin as home, and pulled her close again.

"And honestly, Tom" she continued, her voice muffled by his chest "people like Colonel Bradshaw are not worth wasting your breath on. They don't deserve it"

He grunted ruminatively.

"Maybe you're right"

"Of course I'm right" she smiled "I'm your wife. I'm always right"

It was then that he realised that whatever damage he had done to the relationship with her family, he and Sybil would be alright.

He gave a quiet laugh

"Isn't that the truth ?"


	3. Chapter 3 Dublin, October, 1920

**A/N**: I'm sure this is going to be completely A/U in a few weeks but here you go - enjoy :-)

* * *

At four months old, Niamh Roberta Branson had just started to sleep through the night, much to her exhausted parents relief. Sybil found that she could feed her at eleven and there would not be a peep out of her until six o'clock in the morning, allowing them a precious seven hours of uninterrupted sleep.

The first time this had happened, Sybil had woken just before six, feeling strangely rested. Tom was still fast asleep. It took her but a moment to realise that the baby hadn't been up for a feed and she was out of bed and beside the cot before the nascent fear that had taken root in the pit of her stomach the day her daughter was born had a chance to rear its ugly head. But there was her daughter, arms akimbo, breathing short, shallow baby breaths in her sleep. Relief washed over her and the world righted itself.

Before that, they both had been up at regular intervals during the night. Niamh initially was a lazy, fussy feeder and it would take her an hour to feed. Sybil had been surprised that Tom would usually wake with her, sometimes going and making her a drink, but mostly just keeping her company whilst the baby took her time. He would often wind the baby and replace her in her cot, allowing Sybil to drift off to sleep again straight away. She's tried insisting that he sleep through, seeing as he had to go to work the next day whereas she could nap at home, but he'd been adamant that he wanted to help. Sybil knew he was besotted with his daughter and suspected he was frightened of missing something.

It meant that he was exhausted most of the time. Luckily his editor remembered what it was like to have a new baby, and as long as the timeliness and quality of his work didn't slip, he was prepared to turn a blind eye to Tom nodding off in staff meetings or at his desk at odd times of the day. His colleagues, all single-minded and single, scoffed when they noticed his eyes start to close and accused him of getting old. Generally the baby would be asleep by the time that he got home from work, so Sybil made sure that he ate well and let him fall asleep for an hour for so after dinner. It meant they didn't get much time together any more, but she would rather have a rested husband that an entertaining one. However, a week after Niamh started sleeping through the night, Tom managed to stay awake for the whole evening and tell his wife all about the article he was currently writing. She felt that finally things were returning to some sort of normality between them.

It was nice to have her husband back, she thought as she lifted the baby from his cot. Tom was padding round the bedroom in his pyjama trousers, collecting the clothes he'd left strewn on the floor before he'd had a bath. It alternately amused and enraged her that someone who was usually so ordered in the way he worked could be so messy with his clothes and have so little concern for his appearance.

"Here, let me take her whilst you get settled," he said, dropping his trousers and shirt back on the floor and coming over to take the baby.

Sybil handed the noisy, squirming bundle off to him and climbed into bed, propping her pillows up so she could sit comfortably. She watched them as she undid her nightdress, Tom talking nonsense to the baby, smiling broadly at her and gently rocking her back and forth. Unfortunately her daughter was hungry and therefore unimpressed with her father's efforts, letting out a loud, stuttered wail.

"Shusssh, shush, little one, you'll wake the neighbours…your Mama's here, you're not going to starve….."

Niamh obviously didn't believe this and wailed again.

"Give her here," she said, reaching for her

Once safe in her mother's arms, the baby fed greedily and loudly. Sybil, still entranced by her baby, smiled and stroked her back as she fed. This was her favourite part of the day, the final closeness with her daughter before sleep claimed them both, a time when she could let her mind drift to thoughts of what Niamh had done that day, of how she was growing and changing before her very eyes.

Lost in her own thoughts, it took her a while to notice that Tom hadn't moved and that he was still sat on the side of the bed, just watching her with an expression she couldn't quite decipher on his face. He was idly playing with his daughter's foot.

"What it is ?"

He started, as if he'd just come back from miles away.

"I was just thinking….. "

She looked at him, waiting for him to continue.

"I was just thinking that she's really part of us. You carried her, but I…" he stopped, unsure how to go on without appearing crude, "but watching you feed her, it brings it home to me. She's our flesh and blood. Literally."

She nodded, and looked down at the baby.

"I think anyone that looks at her will know she is your flesh and blood. She's going to be a real Branson, this one - and not just in looks. She has your temperament too"

He laughed gently.

"How can you tell that ? She's only four months old !"

"I'm her mother, that's why !" she smiled. "But seriously, Tom, I know she'll be like you. When I watch her on the floor, trying to roll over, she just keeps trying. She doesn't give up. Or when she's reaching for something, she'll keep reaching rather than scream for it. She's very persistent. And when she's laughing…. the way she smiles is just like you. Like she is very pleased with herself. Don't you, darling" she crooned to the baby, who waved a fist back at her.

"Four months old and she's smug already ?" he said, crawling over her legs to get to the other side of the bed. He settled down beside her and stroked his daughter's head.

Sybil laughed.

"Your mother said you were just the same at this age"

Tom grimaced at the thought of his wife and his mother discussing him as a baby. He wondered how much of his childhood had been revealed to Sybil and shifted uncomfortably. There were quite a few episodes he'd rather she didn't know about, mostly involving his mouth getting him into trouble, which didn't reflect well on him.

"What has she been telling you ?"

She looked at him sideways from under her lashes and smirked.

"Wouldn't you like to know….."

He looked alarmed.

"Don't believe everything my mother tells you…"

"She told me how you took your brother's train apart when you were eight to see how it worked then couldn't put it back together, so your father had to do it."

He grunted, shifting against the pillow to get more comfortable.

"And….she told me that you were always cheeking the priest when you were an altar boy"

He grinned at that.

"It's true - I was the bane of poor Father Francis' life….but he used to cuff me round the ear for it, though"

"It didn't stop you then ?"

He just smirked

"What do you think ? I was ten"

"She also told me you left your sister at the grocer's when she'd sent you out to pay the bill"

Tom's eyes widened.

"That's not true ! Bridget ran off before I could stop her !"

"Did you go after her ?"

He looked rather shamefaced.

"No. I figured she knew the way home and went to play with Seamus McGoven instead."

"You left your six year old sister to find her own way home ?", she said in mock horror.

He rolled his eyes.

"Look," he said, gesturing towards her "you know my sister. Even at the tender age of six no one was going to make the mistake of tangling with her. And everyone 'round our parts knew her, so she was fine"

Sybil smiled, nodding in agreement. She liked Tom's sister a lot, but could not deny her fiery nature.

"And….." she said tentitively, not sure how he was going to react to what she was about to say next "she told me about Maria O'Reilly"

Tom had turned bright red.

"Well, you knew about her anyway," he mumbled uncomfortably

"You didn't tell me her name…. just that she seduced….."

"Sybil, please…"

"Your mother said she broke your heart."

"She did not ! She was a big mistake…and before you say anything, I was only nineteen" he retorted, his cheeks still burning.

"Well, she said that she threw you over after a few weeks and you were…..upset. Did she know that you and she…."

"No, of course she didn't !" he exclaimed, looking horrified at the very idea. "Can we change the subject ?" he said rather tersely

He stole a sideways glance at her and saw she was rather enjoying his discomfort.

"Anyway - why the sudden interest in my nursery crimes ?" he said, changing tack.

"I want to be prepared"

"Huh ?"

"I want to know what this one is likely to get up to. It sounds as if I am going to have to keep a close eye on you, aren't I," she smiled again at the baby, "if you're going to take after your Daddy….."

The baby grinned back at her, promising nothing.

"Well, what if she takes after you ? Then we're in trouble."

Sybil looked up, offended.

"What do you mean ?"

"Well, lying to your parents, sneaking off down to the garage to talk to unsuitable young men…..running off and_ marrying_ them…"

"I did not run off with an unsuitable young man !" she retorted, sitting the baby up and rubbing her back to wind her. "He was rather older than I was," she clarified, smiling mischievously.

"What !"

They both dissolved into a fit of the giggles and the baby, sensing their merriment, joined in with them - then gave a loud burp which made her parents laugh even more.

"Here, let me take her. Does she need changing ?"

Sybil applied an aristocratic nose to the baby's nether regions.

"Oh God, yes. Ugh."

"Pass her over. I'll do it."

Sybil still couldn't believe she was married to a man who was competent at changing nappies and didn't seem to mind doing it. He was the only man she knew who did this. He took the baby and disappeared into the bathroom. She settled back comfortably against her pillows and picked up her book.

"Sybil ?"

She sat bolt upright. There was a edge to his voice that instantly made her uneasy.

"Can you come here a minute ?"

Something was bothering him. She was out of the bed and in the bathroom in her bare feet in a flash.

The baby was lying on a towel, happily playing with her feet, which she found far more interesting that either of her parents. Tom was staring dubiously at the contents of her nappy.

"Is it supposed to look like that ?" he asked, looking up at his wife, his forehead creased with concern.

Sybil peered over his shoulder.

"She had a bottle this afternoon. Its always like that afterwards. I rarely need to give her one, so that's why you've never seen it."

"Oh. So she's alright ?"

"Is she hot ?"

"No"

She knelt down and felt the baby's stomach gently. Niamh watched her, but didn't cry.

"She's fine, Tom, honestly."

He nodded.

"Alright. I'll get her changed then"

He carried on with his task and Sybil wandered back into the bedroom. As she was getting back into bed, it struck her that the conversation she had just had was really rather wonderful. Never, when she was growing up, had she ever thought she would have a conversation about the contents of a baby's nappy with the man she would marry. She doubted her mother had ever had such a conversation with her father and she couldn't begin to imagine Mary having that conversation with Matthew. But it struck her as peculiarly intimate, and she realised that it was these small moments of shared domesticity that were so precious in their marriage. She had shared truly intimate moments with Tom - the time they first kissed, their wedding and what came after, when she told him she was pregnant - times when it seemed that the world had shrunk to contain them alone, but it was sharing moments like the one that had just passed that knit and twisted them together and made their marriage as strong as a rope.

"What are you smiling about ?"

Tom had come back in with the baby in her nightgown, clean and fresh and ready for bed. She realised her thoughts would not make sense if she gave them voice, so she just shook her head.

"Nothing important…."

He smiled back at her and made to put Niamh back in her cot, all the while talking to her in the sing song voice he used for conversing with his daughter. She looked at the baby in his arms. One day, in all likelihood, that small creature would be on his arm, walking down an aisle somewhere. Sybil couldn't quite believe that this would ever happen - but then, Niamh had changed so much already. She thought back to what her Mama had said when her daughter was born….."Enjoy every moment, Sybil - they're babies for such a short time. Then before you know it, they're parents themselves."

She could't even imagine Niamh as a toddler, let along a fully grown woman. She sighed as Tom came back to bed and climbed in beside her.

"It won't be long before she's off" he said, turning to her and gathering her up in his arms. "What was that big sigh for ? You're being very enigmatic tonight"

Sybil looked at his face on the pillow next to her, and felt again that sense of wonder that she was really here, really sharing this life with this man. She so nearly missed out on this. The thought made her go cold inside. She shuffled a little closer to him to feel his warmth, making sure he was real.

"I was just thinking of her grown up, wondering what sort of woman she's going to be"

Tom looked at her, surprised.

"Sybil, she's not even walking yet" he smiled, "and already you're worrying about the trouble she'll be getting into when she's fifteen."

She eyed him sardonically.

"Well, now I know more about her father and what he got up to….."

"Oh come now," he chided her gently, kissing her forehead "I turned out alright in the end, didn't I ? Well enough for you to want to marry me"

She smiled, turning in his arms.

"I suppose so," she said, reaching up to stroke his face "if you count patience as a virtue" she said, kissing him gently "and kindness…" she kissed him again "and passion…and honesty…and tenderness…and …"

She didn't get the chance to list the rest of Tom's virtues, deciding in the end it was a better idea to show him her appreciation. Tom reached out and fumbled for the light.


	4. Chapter 4 Manchester, February, 1921

**A/N: ** OK this chapter is where this thing goes totally AU. It's a bit off the wall and I am pretty sure that nothing like it will happen on the show !

* * *

**Manchester, February, 1921**.

The fact that he might one day have to choose between fighting for Ireland's future and his new family had been in the back of Tom's mind ever since his face was slammed into the wall during a raid of the paper's offices by a brutish British seargent, incensed that an Irishman would answer him back. Sybil had silently tended her husband's bruised face and split lip when he'd arrived home shaking with anger and delayed fear. He'd lain on their sofa and let her practiced fingers feel his ribs and abdomen for any injuries, feeling strangely reassured that it felt completely different to the way she normally touched him, that this was how she touched other men. Sybil herself tried to stay calm and quelled her rising panic by being professional, treating Tom as she would any other patient, only trying to avoid looking into his eyes. But as she finished and she realised his injuries were not that bad, her hands had betrayed her and had started to shake as tears formed in her eyes. He'd caught her fingers then, pressing them to his lips, whispering that he was alright, he wasn't badly hurt, that he would be fine. But the spectre of what might have been, what might be next time had been conjured and would not leave them alone. By some unspoken agreement, they carried on as normal and his injuries healed. But when he'd come home to find his young wife sitting in their flat in the dark, wide-eyed with fear after she had called upon every ounce of her aristocratic upbringing to face down a British army officer who'd arrived at their door with two armed men wanting to search their flat, he knew the decision was made for him. There was no way he would subject Sybil to that sort of treatment. They were due to travel back to Downton for Christmas in a few weeks; Tom knew at that point that they wouldn't be coming back any time soon.

Convincing Sybil that a move back to England was necessary was another issue. She'd been outraged more than afraid when the British army arrived on her doorstep demanding to turn over her home. But her privileged background and experience with army officers had stood her in good stead and she had sent them packing. It was only after that possible alternative scenarios started to play in her head and she'd realised the danger she and the baby had been in. Tom had been furious at her treatment when he'd come home, and even more furious about the fact there wasn't a great deal he could do about it. But when he had brought up the idea of returning to England, she had resisted. She knew how important what he was doing was to him and she refused to be the reason he gave that up. Wives of other journalists, she pointed out, didn't have any option but to stay put and cope with the intimidation and she didn't want to be any different. They'd argued as she stubbornly clung to this position and it wasn't until Tom's frustration erupted and he told her in no uncertain terms that she and the baby were the most important things in his life and that if anything happened to either of them he wouldn't be able to live with himself, indeed, wouldn't be able to live, that she was humbled into agreeing to returning to England and staying with her parents until they could get themselves settled.

His first priority once they were back in England was to find another job. His editor had been sad to see him go and was initially less than sympathetic about his reasons for doing so. But he saw how much of a struggle the decision was for Tom, so he shrewdly pointed out to him that changing public opinion in Britain was going to be key in Ireland gaining independence. There were several papers that were critical of the British action in Ireland; perhaps Tom should consider writing for one of these, to present an Irishman's view to the British reading public. Indeed, he had a contact at the Manchester Guardian - he would arrange a meeting for him. Tom was sceptical at first, thinking it wasn't going to be possible to report on Irish affairs without being there and he had reservations about working for a Liberal paper. He was also conscious of the fact that he probably didn't have the experience required for writing for such a well known broadsheet. But he took up the offer anyway, thinking it could do no harm. He also wrote to several local Yorkshire papers, looking for a position as a local reporter.

In the event, he had been surprised by the response. The Guardian had wanted to see him. The interview in Manchester had gone much better than he could have imagined, the editor there seemingly impressed by what he had read of Tom's work, interested in his ideas and perspectives and unconcerned by either his lack of experience or his socialist viewpoint. One of the local papers had shown interest as well, so in the end he had two offers of employment; the first as a staff reporter for the Yorkshire Post, a paper who's political leanings were far to the right of his own and whose editor took a very different stance on the nascent labour movement than he did. Then to his amazement, he was also asked to join the political desk of the Manchester Guardian. He would be by far the most junior journalist there, but it was a wonderful opportunity to have his work read by a large readership. It seemed so unlikely to him that he should be offered a position that he immediately suspected the influence of the Dowager Countess. His wife scoffed at the idea, reminding him that Granny would rather live without servants than be indebted to a Liberal. The Guardian were also offering to increase his current salary considerably, to the point where, if they were prudent, they would be able to manage quite well without Sybil's allowance. It seemed that for once, fortune was with them.

It had been an exhausting day and despite being dog tired, Tom was wide awake, lying in their new bed, in the largest bedroom of the house they had just rented. The only other things in the room was the baby's travelling cot, a chair and a long mirror from Sybil's bedroom at Downton and a couple of open trunks. Both Sybil and his daughter were fast asleep, Sybil curled up beside him, snoring softly.

He leant over and retrieved his watch from where he'd left it on the floor beside the bed. Quarter past two. This was ridiculous. If he fidgeted much longer he would wake his wife up. So he swung his legs over the side of the bed, got up and padded over to the window, the bare boards cold under his feet. He moved the curtain aside a little to look out at the street, careful not to let too much light into the room.

It was a perfectly ordinary quiet residential street in a pleasant suburb of Manchester. It had snowed again that evening, adding a fresh crisp layer of whiteness over everything and deadening the silence of the small hours. The houses all stood a little way back from the road, some on their own small plots, some semi-detached. They were all different, individual; built at different times by merchants, solicitors and doctors as homes to live in, not by some speculator building a huge estate of identical boxes for clerks and tradesmen for a profit. They were comfortable and spacious, not large, but much larger than the sort of house Tom had grown up in. The present owner of the house they had rented for the year was worked for a coffee importer, whose career had taken him and his family to Kenya. There were streets like this in Dublin, not where he'd lived, but he'd walked down roads with similar houses on his way to the grammar school he had attended for two years as a scholarship boy. He'd even been inside a few of them, when one or two of the few friends he'd made had invited him home to tea. His parents had been so proud of his scholarship - his father might be a union leader, but he saw education as the real liberator. All the Branson children were well read, but Tom had been the bright spark of the family and his father encouraged him to work hard and try for the Grammar School. He'd been a little overawed at the thought of mixing with a load of "posh kids", but his father instilled in him the belief that he was any man's equal and he had as much right to a good education as they did. But all that changed when he was fourteen - his father dying in an industrial accident (that some said maybe was a rather convenient accident for an outspoken nationalist and union man who frequently made life difficult for his employers) and Tom was forced to leave school and go into service.

There was a time when he would think of his father every day, but the years passed and he moved on and he found he was rarely in his mind. Even when he'd got married, he'd only paused briefly to wish his father had been alive to see it. But since the birth of his daughter, Tom began to miss his own father again and found himself wondering what his old man would have thought of his son, with his middle class job, living in this middle class house with an aristocratic wife. Not that his father wouldn't have loved Sybil, he thought, with her gentle nature belying her passionate temperament. And he was sure he would have been proud of him being a journalist, being able to lay the truth before a reading public.

The window he was standing next to had a deep wooden sill, so, unwilling to go back to bed, he hauled himself up on it and tucked his bare feet up against the windows wooden frame. The glass was white with crescents of shimmering crystals and his warm breath made misty shadows on the panes. The window frames had been recently painted, he noticed, testament to the fact that this house had been looked after, that this was someone's well-loved home. When he'd accepted the job in Manchester and the move had been decided, Sybil had been quite adamant that she wanted a house. He'd thought that a flat would have been better in the interim as their future was still so uncertain and he thought, dependant on the situation in Ireland, but he sensed that motherhood had made her want something that felt more permanent, somewhere she felt she could bring up their daughter. So they had looked at a few houses, surprised at what they could afford, but when they saw this one her face had lit up almost as soon as they were though the door. As they were being shown around upstairs, she was looking at him pleadingly and by the time the agent showed them the small garden he was convinced she would leave him if they didn't take it.

So here he was. He'd always been determined to make something of himself, but when he thought of this he pictured himself doing something that was key to advancing the cause of the working man, or of Ireland's independence. He'd not given any thought to the possible material consequences of doing so. The fact was that with his new job, even without Sybil's allowance, they were quite well off by his standards. They could afford to rent this house and have help in (although Sybil refused any help with the baby). By Tom's standards, they were very comfortably off. And it he wasn't totally at ease with it.

No one who knew him would ever call Tom Branson a reflective man, least of all his wife, being all to familiar with his habit of single mindedly pursuing a goal without fully thinking through the consequences. But as he sat in the window, looking out into the street in the early hours of a frosty Sunday morning, even he could see that as a man he was a mass of contradictions. A socialist married to an aristocrat. An Irish nationalist choosing to live and work in England. A fighter for the working man pulling down a salary easily three times the national average. His father had been the opposite, a man who lived and worked with the men he fought for, who married a woman born two streets away and who brought up his children as he himself had been brought up. He was a man who commanded universal respect; a man who, if Tom couldn't have his approbation, he wanted to emulate.

"God, Pa," he sighed, looking out at the street, "what on earth would you make of me ?"

"Why don't you ask me ?" his father's voice replied.

Tom's eyes widened and he turned his head to see his father standing in the shadows by the window. He blinked several times, closed his eyes and reopened them, but his father was still there, regarding him with an amused look. He thought he must be dreaming so he pinched himself hard. It hurt, and the apparition, if that was what it was, was still there.

"Who are you ?" he asked stupidly

"Ah, come now, son, don't you recognise your own father ?"

"Yes, but…..you're…."

"Dead ? Yes, I know."

The figure came out of the shadows to stand a little closer. It was his father, as he remembered him just before he died, wearing the same clothes he would go to work in. Now it was Tom's turn to stare curiously. The figure before him looked remarkably solid, not ethereal, or transparent or even remotely ghostly.

"What are you, then ?"

"That I don't know. I just know that I am here"

"I don't believe in ghosts" Tom said, slightly defensively

"I don't think it matters whether you do or not. I'm still here"

"Why ?"

His father sighed.

"Haven't changed, have you ? Still always asking questions. I don't quite know why or how I am here, to be honest. Maybe its because you wanted to talk to me ?"

The figure sat down on the window seat beside him. If Tom had moved his foot three inches he could have touched it, but something, fear or respect or both, stopped him. He suddenly felt rather shy.

"Did you recognise me ?" he asked "Its been sixteen years since you died"

His father smiled.

"Of course I did. You look like I did when I was your age"

A slow smile crept across his mouth. His mother had told him he resembled his father but it felt good to hear it from his own lips. Then he realised with a shock that his father was still in fact a relatively young man. He could only be around ten years older than Tom himself.

The figure looked around the room.

"Nice place you've got here"

"We're just renting it for the year. See what happens in Ireland" he hesitated "don't you think its a bit too…grand for the likes of me ?"

His father looked at him, digging in his pockets for something. Eventually he took out a pipe and a roll of tobacco.

"For the likes of you ? What did I tell you, Thomas Branson ? About being any man's equal ?" he said as he pulled some tobacco from the roll and carefully filled the pipe bowl, just as Tom remembered "Why do you feel this is too grand for you ? You don't think its too grand for her," he said, gesturing towards the bed with his pipe "I don't suppose you've got a light, have you ?"

Tom shook his head.

"I don't smoke"

His father grunted.

"Good lad, I suppose" he looked at him keenly. "And the drink ? You keep off of that ?"

Tom rolled his eyes. His father had apparently come back from the grave to lecture him on the evils of strong drink as if he were a teenager.

"Yes, Pa. Apart from the occasional whiskey."

"And women ?"

"Pa ! I'm married with a baby !"

"Didn't stop your Uncle Brian," muttered his father

Tom raised his eyebrows. He'd forgotten that his father and his uncle didn't get on but as a child had never known the reason why

"I couldn't do that to Sybil. I didn't spend five years of my life waiting for her to only run off with someone else the minute we're married. And anyway, no-one else could possibly come close to her"

His father looked at him sceptically

"You mean to say that out of all the women in the world, she's the only one who could possibly make you happy ?"

Tom nodded.

"Yes"

"The English daughter of an Earl ? It seems rather unlikely, given the way you were brought up…."

"Are you telling me you don't approve ?" he asked, a little defiantly.

"I'm…surprised"

"I don't care, Pa. I love her. That's all there is to it."

"But you come from two completely different worlds…how could she possibly make you happy ?"

Tom shrugged.

"She just does…" he looked over at her sleeping form, smiling involuntarily as he did so. "She's never wanted what she was brought up to want. She wants to make her own life…."

"With an impoverished Irishman ?"

"It would seem so," Tom replied, his chin up, "anyway, weren't you the one who told me I was any man's equal ?"

"And so you are," said his father, "I'm just surprised she knows that"

Tom smiled

"Sybil's full of surprises to those that don't know her"

His father looked across at the bed, a little sadly, as if realising he would never know his daughter-in-law.

"So you love her," he said

Tom nodded

"And what about Ireland ? You loved her once too…"

Tom shifted uncomfortably.

"I still do"

"Do you ?' said his father sharply, "then what are you doing in England ?"

"It wasn't safe…." he frowned

His father gave him a hard look

"A war is never safe. What did you expect ?"

"This isn't Sybil's war….."

"Of course it is," said his father impatiently, "it became her war the minute she married an Irishman"

"I won't have her hurt"

"Sometimes the future needs terrible sacrifices….." his father echoed the words he'd told Sybil years ago in the garage

"I'd put my life on the line for Ireland willingly, but not my family's !"

"That explains why they are here - not why you are"

Tom stared at his bare feet.

"It was the only way I could get her to come," he mumbled "she said if I was going to stay, then so were she and the baby"

His father looked surprised

"She's got some guts, that one," he said

"Oh, you don't know the half of it," said his son, smiling ruefully.

A thoughtful silence descended and Tom realised he was cold. He wrapped his arms around himself tightly, wriggling his toes to restore the circulation to them. His father, in just his rolled up shirtsleeves and his old brown waistcoat, seemed impervious to the chill in the air. His skin was pale, almost translucent, with a bluish tinge to it.

"I haven't sold out, you know," he said, feeling sure that was what his father was thinking. "I've got a chance to tell the truth to the British readership. Changing public opinion over here is going to be crucial."

"Convieniently with a decent salary and a comfortable lifestyle"

"That had nothing to do with it ! "

His father held his gaze, as if assessing his son's sincerity and waiting for him to look away. He didn't.

"No," his father conceded, "I dare say it didn't"

"And I have a family to provide for now. It's not just me any more. I have to think of Sybil and the baby too. Surely you understand that ?"

"Even if it means your children will grow up with English accents ?"

"It's better that she grows up with an English accent than she grows up without one or other of her parents," he retorted. "And anyway, she won't. We'll go back to Ireland as soon as its safe."

"Are you sure about that ?" his father asked.

Tom frowned, a little confused.

"Yes, of course. Why wouldn't we ?"

"You might get….. comfortable here"

He looked at his father steadily.

"We'll go back as soon as we can," he said firmly.

"Well, we'll see," his father muttered.

Tom sighed in exasperation

"What would have done in my place ? Turned down the chance of keeping your family safe ? It was all right for you, you never had to choose between your family and your principles "

"If you'd married someone Irish, of your own class, you wouldn't have had to make that choice either."

"I didn't fall in love with someone Irish"

"You didn't give yourself the chance"

Tom decided he had had enough

"Is that what you've come for ? To tell me I'm a disappointment to you ?" he asked bitterly.

His father twisted the pipe in his hands, staring at it as if contemplating this question.

"No," he said, looking up at Tom, "I came to see if you were a disappointment to yourself "

Tom found he couldn't hold his gaze and looked down at his feet again.

"I'm just trying to do the right thing by my wife and daughter. I want to be a good husband, a good father. Sybil left her family and her whole way of life to be with me. I owe her that."

"She knew who you were when she married you. She wouldn't want you to stop fighting"

"I haven't stopped fighting. I'm just not on the front line any more. I still believe I can make a difference, though. In fact I might make even more of a difference here than back in Ireland"

His father regarded him carefully for a moment, and then sighed.

"I suppose someone has to tell these people the truth. Who was it who said the pen was mightier than the sword ?"

"I don't remember," his son replied, smiling, "but whoever it was, they were right"

His father smiled back at him.

"You're a good man, Tom Branson. Don't you ever let anyone tell you otherwise."

"Even you ?"

He laughed softly, a sound that Tom realised he had almost forgotten.

"Even me."

His father's smile faded and he put his pipe in his pocket and got up.

"I have to go."

Tom nodded, and suddenly he was fourteen again, watching them lower the box that contained his fathers body into the ground. He could feel his eyes start to prickle and he rubbed them angrily.

His father looked over at Sybil.

"You treat that girl well, you hear. She loves you a great deal - more than you deserve, probably. And mind you bring up my granddaughter up right. Make sure she knows where she comes from."

Tom nodded slowly.

"I will. You can be sure of that."

"Now let me see her before I go"

He slipped off the window ledge and through the curtains. His father didn't follow him, so he knelt and carefully took the sleeping child out of her travelling cot and brought her back to the window.

His father looked at her face and smiled. He went to stroke her cheek, but his hand stopped before he could, as if some invisible barrier were preventing him.

"She's beautiful"

Tom gave his father a wide grin. He couldn't help but feel ridiculously proud.

"What did you call her ?"

"Niamh. Sybil insisted we give her an Irish name"

As if she knew she was being talked about, Niamh stretched in his arms and opened her mouth wide.

"Put her back down before she wakes up," advised his father, "if she takes after you she'll be yelling the house down if she does "

Tom snorted, but returned the baby to her cot. When he turned around, his father was gone.

Moving the curtain aside, he found the window seat empty. He placed his palm on the spot his father had occupied and sat down heavily, frowning at his hand for a long while. Eventually he curled his legs under his chin, closed his eyes and pressed his forehead to the glass, letting the sadness wash over him.

"Tom ? " someone was shaking his arm "Tom, sweetheart, how long have you been here ?"

He looked up. It was still dark and Sybil was standing next to him with a concerned look on her face.

"What are you doing here ? You're frozen ! Come back to bed….."

He blinked at her stupidly.

"I couldn't sleep. What time is it ?"

"Four in the morning…Darling, what's the matter ?" she gently brushed her thumb over his cheek, "what's upset you ?"

He opened his mouth, but realised that he wasn't really sure what to say.

"I was just thinking about my father"

She looked at him sadly, then wound her arms around him and lay her head in the crook of his shoulder.

"You never talk about him"

He sighed.

"It was a long time ago. But I've been thinking about him a lot since the little one was born"

She turned her face up to his so she could see him.

"Do you miss him ?"

He nodded, wrinkling his forehead.

She rubbed his back.

"You must be exhausted. It was a busy day yesterday."

She slipped out of his arms and grabbed his hand, tugging him up gently. He was reminded about what his father said about her. A lump came to his throat and he swallowed, then slipped off the window seat.

"Sybil…..was I asleep ?" he asked

She looked at him, a little confused.

"I think so….I'm not sure….you were facing the window so I couldn't really tell…"

He grunted. He was stiff with cold and he ached all over from sitting cramped up for so long. He must have been asleep, must have dreamt the whole thing.

She tugged again.

"Come on, you, lets get you to bed…."

He smiled and took a step to follow her then stopped dead. There, mixed with the dust on the floorboards underneath the window, were a few strands of pipe tobacco.

"


	5. Chapter 5 Manchester, June 1921

**Manchester, June, 1921 - Sybil and Tom's second wedding anniversary.**

The morning of the twenty-fifth of June proved to be bright and sunny - very different, Sybil thought, to the day they had been married, which had been overcast and muggy, heavy with the storm that was to come later that evening. It was a Monday, so the morning had been typically busy, getting the baby up and fed and Tom out of the door in time to catch his tram. But he'd lingered as he's kissed her goodbye, stroking her cheek with the back of his fingers

"I'll see you tonight, Mrs Branson…"

And with that, he'd kissed her forehead and hurried off on his way to the tram stop.

Sybil had smiled secretively to herself and helped Niamh wave to him as he closed the front gate.

She rather envied Tom having a job to go to - she had loved being at home with her baby, but now Niamh was older, she was beginning to feel the need to work again. She had made the acquaintance of several young working mothers through her involvement in the suffrage movement in Manchester, so she knew working with a baby was m possible. She had high hopes of finding someone reliable to mind the baby without going to the lengths of hiring a nanny or nurserymaid full time.

But for today, she had plans. Their first wedding anniversary had passed somewhat quietly - she'd been nearly eight months pregnant, tired and uncomfortable. It had been shortly after Edith's ill fated wedding and they had still been at Downton. Reminding her family of the fact that a year ago she had run off with the chauffeur and married him didn't seem a particularly good idea just then, so they had kept it to themselves, celebrating quietly in their room by lying on the bed talking about their wedding and the remarkable year they had just shared.

This year, she wanted things to be different. Sybil had acquired many roles in her short life; daughter, nurse, wife, mother - but today there was only one role she was interested in fulfilling - that of lover. She made short work of her household tasks, changing the bedlinen for crisp, fresh sheets, tidying their bedroom and the living room, preparing a light supper for that evening - _for_ _after_, she thought, smiling to herself, _when he will be ravenous_... She took Niamh to the park and whilst the baby had her afternoon nap, she took a long bath, then treating every inch of her skin with lotion until it was soft, supple and faintly scented. She then took out the long silk nightdress she had worn on her wedding night, grinning as she remembered the trouble it had caused.

_"Tom," she'd gasped, trying to pull his head away from her chest, where he was entirely focussed on kissing a line down from her throat, "Tom, I can't move my leg…"_

_"What ?" he'd said, a little impatiently, when he finally looked up._

_"My leg. I can't move it. You're on my nightdress."_

_"Oh…" he'd said, shifting his body slightly, "is that better ?"_

_She'd moved her knee up to rest against his hip, the silk of the long nightgown slipping up her thigh._

_"Yes…" but he didn't hear her as he'd already returned to kissing her collarbone._

_He'd tried to slip her nightgown off her shoulder, but the straps were too wide and refused to budge more than a few inches. Frustrated, he'd dragged his hand down her side and her other leg, his fingers working the silk up until he reached the hem, then trying to run his hand underneath it. He found he couldn't as the material was hugging her leg too closely. He stopped kissing her briefly, bringing a impatient whimper from his wife, and looked down at the problem. He gave the material a few sharp tugs, trying to free it._

_"What are you doing ?" she said, craning her neck to see._

_He sighed in frustration and rolled onto his side. Sybil found herself staring at his bare chest, inches away from her. She watched transfixed as her fingers moved of their own volition, tracing a line down its centre. He slipped the now-free nightgown up her thigh._

_"Can we take this off ? Please ?" he'd asked humbly, his brown furrowed with anxiety in case it was too soon and she wasn't ready for this._

_Their eyes met briefly before she sat up and nodded at him, raising her arms as he knelt to draw the silk gown over her head._

_She would never forget the look on his face as he saw her naked for the first time. He inhaled sharply, his mouth dropping open a little and his eyes lingering on her body._

_"Oh…." was all he said._

_She'd expected to feel shy, but she was surprised to find that his reaction emboldened her and she sat perfectly still, smiling, finding she enjoyed the feeling that the sight of her body could render him speechless._

_"You're so, so beautiful….." he whispered, reaching out to touch her, then hesitating, looking up into her eyes again, uncertain of what to do._

_She took the hand that tentatively hung in mid air and guided it to her waist. It was warm against her skin._

_"Tom….."_

_He'd pulled her to him then, and the feeling of his bare skin against hers made them both gasp, the closeness making them dizzy. He kissed her again, falling back down on the bed._

_"You too….." she'd whispered urgently, tugging at his underpants…._

She'd woken Niamh a little earlier than usual, as she wanted her to be tired and ready to go to bed on time. Then they'd played quietly for a while before she fed her and gave her a bath, all the while keeping an eye on the clock, counting down the hours until her husband would walk through the door.

Tom got home rather later than he expected. A story had broken half way through the afternoon, which required a dash across town to interview the leader of the dockers union, who had just walked out of the negotiation of a pay dispute and was threatening a strike. It meant a tortuous journey home through the evening rush hour with standing room only on the trams, leaving him drained. He had wanted to take Sybil out for the evening, but she had been strangely (he thought) unenthusiastic about the idea. When he walked through his front door to find both his wife and his daughter dressed for bed, he could see that she clearly had had plans of her own.

Sybil was just putting the baby down. He kissed them both, then freed himself of his tie and helped himself to a restorative whiskey, poured one for his wife and waited for her to join him.

The tumbler was half empty and he was feeling much more relaxed by the time she came back downstairs. She paused in the doorway, dressed in the long ivory satin nightdress that he remembered from her wedding night. It hugged her body a little tighter than before she'd had the baby, but it just served to emphasise the curves of her breasts and hips and the neatness of her waist. She was smiling her small, secret smile, the one that meant she was very pleased with herself. He stared at her, his glass frozen half way to his lips, finally returning her smile and offering her a glass, which she took as she shifted herself onto his lap.

"How was your day ?" she asked, looking at him intently as she sipped her drink, letting him trail his fingers up and down her bare forearm.

"Horrible," he said, "but I have a feeling its about to get a lot better…."

Neither of them finished their whiskey, but he could taste it on her breath and her tongue as she began to kiss him. Eventually, she slipped off his lap and extended a hand, tugging him out of his chair and leading him upstairs to their bedroom.

He had learnt from experience - the nightdress was the first thing that hit the floor, closely followed by his waistcoat and shirt, then after some interruption, his trousers. This is a much better way of spending the evening, he thought smiling to himself as he caressed the curve from her hip to her still tiny waist, his favourite part of her body, moving to place small light kisses along the same path. Sybil sighed contentedly and let her fingers run through his hair, the other hand running her fingers up and down his spine.

There was a stuttering sound from the baby's room. She stiffened as it became a full blown cry. Tom stopped momentarily, but then continued to place kisses on her hip, but her hands lay still and he could tell she was listening to the baby.

"Don't worry, darling - she'll go back to sleep in a minute…"

But the cries were increasing in volume and were changing to a desperate wail. He stopped what he was doing and looked up at her and sighed.

"I won't be long," she promised as she slipped out of bed, looking round for her dressing gown. She picked it up, slipped it on and disappeared out of the door.

He hauled himself up and leant back against the headboard, listening as the baby's cries changed as she saw her mother, diminishing and then stopping completely. A few minutes later, Sybil returned.

"Is she all right ?"

"Yes - she was probably just dreaming."

"Did she go back to sleep ?"

"Almost," she said, smiling as she untied her dressing gown and shrugged it off her shoulders, letting it fall to the floor. "Now, where were we…."

It didn't take them too long to recover from the interruption. Things had just began to heat up rather pleasantly when the baby started crying again. This time, Tom was not going to surrender his wife to his daughter without a fight.

"Leave her," he said, pinning her to the bed with a determined kiss, "she'll go back to sleep in a minute…"

But his kisses were not being returned with any passion and he could feel the tension build in her body. He stopped, looking ruefully at her.

"She's fine, you said so yourself…."

'I know," she said in a small voice, clearly unconvinced.

He sighed as he rolled over onto his back.

"Come here," he said, bringing her with him and kissing the top of her head.

They lay there together for several minutes, listening as the baby's cries for her Mama got louder and more distressed.

"I feel like I'm abandoning her," Sybil said into his chest

"She's just doing it to get your attention"

Sybil looked up at him.

"I know - but it doesn't make me feel any better. She's still upset…." she had started to pull away from him, laying back on the pillow and putting her hand over her eyes.

"I can't listen to this any longer"

He shook his head as she slid out of bed once more, grabbed her dressing gown and disappeared. He heard the baby quieten down again and shortly Sybil reappeared.

"Asleep ?" he asked.

"No, but she's very tired. I don't know what's got into her."

She slipped back onto the bed beside him, this time not bothering to remove her dressing gown. He put his arm round her and pulled her into his side, her head resting on his chest as he gently rubbed her forearm with his thumb. Already, their mood had changed and they had slipped unconsciously from lovers to parents.

"Tom ?"

"Hmmm ?" he murmured into her hair

"If they do call a truce, will we go back to Ireland ?"

"Do you want to go back ?" he asked

"Yes, of course I do," she said, turning to look up at him. "I want Niamh to grow up in Ireland."

"Its just that you seem so settled here. And we have this place until the end of the year anyway."

She just looked at him, a little confused.

"I just don't think we should rush into anything" he explained, "we need to make sure the truce will hold, otherwise we'll be back where we started."

"But surely with the truce the British will have to negotiate a settlement ?"

He sighed.

"Well that's just it. What sort of a settlement ? If the Dail accepts dominion status and Ulster is really is lost, which it probably will be - then there are going to be a lot of unhappy people. People who who fought for an Ireland united as a republic will feel betrayed….."

She sat up.

"What do you mean ? "

"They might turn on the people who made that decision."

Her eyes widened.

"A civil war ?" she said, shocked. "Surely, after everything that everyone has been through…."

"Sometimes I think that the hatred of the British is the only thing that keeps these people together…..and when the British are gone…who knows what will happen ?"

"Oh Tom," she whispered tenderly. He drew her closer to him.

"I don't want to have to take sides, Sybil, not after….. But if there is a civil war I will have to…."

She reached up to stroke his face gently with her thumb.

"I can't face seeing Ireland tear itself apart, just when….."

His voice cracked. She pushed herself further into his arms and kissed him gently, letting her nose rub against his.

"It might not come to that…"

"But if….'

"Sssshh" she whispered, gently pressing her fingers against his lips, then slowly, tenderly dragging them down over his chin and throat. His own hand made its way into her hair, the fingers flexing involuntarily, tugging gently. He kissed her then, unconsciously noting the softness of her lips and the fact that she still tasted vaguely of whiskey. For the next few moments, the world beyond their bed ceased to exist.

Except, of course, that it didn't. Sybil felt him pull away a little and rest his chin on the top of her head, pulling her even closer. She could tell he was still thinking.

"There's something else," he said. "I'm not sure I could find a job as good as this one in Dublin'

"We can live on less - we've done it before…."

He was silent, so she looked up at him only to find what she could only describe as a slightly guilty look on his face.

"What is it ?" she asked

He sighed.

"I _like_ this job - I'll admit it - I never thought I would, working for an English paper - but I do. It's….."

He was cut off mid-admission by a cry from the baby's room. Niamh was still awake.

"Oh Lord," he groaned, "not again…"

It put an end to any further conversation. They lay there listening to her for a few minutes as she worked herself up into a frenzy, when he felt Sybil begin to move.

"Don't," he said, holding her fast, "I'll go"

She watched as he rummaged for his pyjama trousers, pulling them on swiftly as he got out of bed and went to the baby, leaving the door ajar so Sybil could hear him trying to calm their daughter.

Niamh was standing up in her cot, clinging to its sides and grizzling loudly when her father came in. She looked a picture of misery, obviously thinking she had been cruelly abandoned by parents who appeared to be more interested in each other tonight than in her - a state of affairs she was not prepared to tolerate.

Tom picked her up, and she calmed down a little, looking at him solemnly, her grizzling becoming nothing more than a monotone drone. He kissed the top of her head and spoke soothingly to her, and then started to sing her a song he remembered from his own childhood.

Sybil could hear him in their bedroom and smiled.

Soon the baby was silent, her eyes fighting to stay open. Tom kept up his song, willing her to go to sleep. Eventually her eyelids started to flutter shut as she gave in to her exhaustion.

Carefully, still singing, he replaced her in the cot. The minute he let go of her, her eyes flew open and she started to cry again.

"Oh, please, little one, just go to sleep !" he said, closing his eyes in frustration.

He picked the tired little girl up again and watched as she rubbed her eyes.

"You're so tired you just don't know what to do with yourself, do you ?" he said "Come on then, I suppose you can come in with us, just this once…." He moved towards the door, only for Niamh to let out a frantic wail, writhing against him and reaching back at her cot.

"What's the matter ?...Oh...you want Eamonn..."

He reached down and retrieved a small, rather limp stuffed bear. Satisfied he was coming too, she settled down and allowed her father to carry her out of the bedroom.

Sybil was surprised to see both Tom, Niamh and Niamh's favourite bear come back into the room.

"I thought we agreed she wasn't coming in our bed ?" she asked, "you said we'd never get any peace if she did"

"Well we're not getting any peace now," he replied rather tersely.

He put the baby on the bed next to Sybil, who picked her up and sat her on her lap, where she snuggled into her mother, clutching her bear. Sybil eased it from her grasp and tucked in under the blanket between herself and Tom.

"Look, darling," she said, "Eamonn's tired and is going to sleep. Why don't you go to sleep with him ? "

"No"

"But poor Eamonn will be lonely without you !"

Niamh looked into her mother's face, as if wary of a plot to have her back in her cot.

"Its lovely and warm under there - just snuggle down and close your eyes….." Sybil said, coaxing her suspicious daughter off her lap.

She scrabbled under the blankets, kicking her father with surprising force in the process. He grumbled and shuffled nearer to the edge of the bed. Happy, Niamh closed her eyes.

She was asleep within minutes.

Once again, Tom was floored by the ease with which his wife could get their often wilful and unruly daughter to do as she was bid. His own suggestions that she conform to any plan were generally met with an emphatic shake of the head, if she deigned to answer him at all. A suggestion that she might finish her breakfast would be met with a look that came straight from the Dowager Countess herself. Yet Sybil could quietly coax her into whatever she wanted her to do and Niamh would generally be quite happy to comply. He loved being a parent with his whole heart, but fatherhood often left him feeling completely out of his depth.

Sybil smiled down at her sleeping daughter, gently stroking her hair.

'She looks adorable when she's asleep"

"She is adorable when she's asleep," said Tom, "its when she's awake that the problems start"

His frustration with the way his evening was going was making him grumpy. Sybil considered him pensively, thinking that perhaps this meant that their evening could be salvaged.

"Let's give her a few more minutes then take her back to her room."

Tom watched his wife watching his daughter and an unwilling grin broke out on his face. I'm a lucky man, he thought - they're both beautiful, and both mine. His daughter had given him a new perspective on his homeland's freedom - he no longer wanted it for himself - he wanted it for Niamh, for her to grow up in an Ireland that governed its own destiny, an Ireland where she wouldn't feel second class because of her accent or her religion, or even because her mother was English. He lay back and propped himself up on his elbow and dropped a small kiss on his daughter's head.

"I think she's well away"

As if by some unspoken agreement they both climbed out of bed. Tom scooped up the sleeping form of his child and carried her back to her own room, Sybil following him.

He lay her back down in her cot and Sybil tucked her bear beside her. They stood, watching her sleep, as unconsciously Sybil's hand found his and she turned and lead him out of the room.

Shutting the door behind him, she stopped and pulled him closer to her, winding her arms around his neck.

"I love you, Tom Branson," she smiled before kissing him slowly.

Tom just murmured an assent, being too occupied for speech.

They pulled away from each other and it was as if the frustration of the evening suddenly broke, as the next minute he had pushed her against the wall and was kissing her with abandon.

"Oh, God…." was all she could manage, before he scooped her up and carried her to the bedroom.

* * *

Sometime later they were lying on the bed, basking in the afterglow of their lovemaking.

"I think we've improved since our wedding night," she said playfully, happily dragging her spread fingers across his stomach.

Tom gave a snort.

"I should hope so. We've had enough practice…" he said, raising an eyebrow

"Do you remember what you said you were going to do to me that night ?"

He turned to her and abruptly pulled her in to his chest.

"I remember wanting to do a lot of things to you that night" he replied cheekily

She giggled

"You didn't manage to do half of them !"

"Only because someone fell asleep !"

"Don't look at me !" she yelped, "you fell asleep first !"

"I did not !"

Sybil just raised an eyebrow.

"Are you complaining, Mrs Branson ?"

"No…..not at all….." she said, pushing him over on his back again so she could kiss him better "its just that…..certain promises were made that night which haven't been fulfilled yet"

"Oh yes ?" her husband said sceptically "I find that very hard to believe….."

"Specifically," she said, looking a little disappointed, "you said you were going to kiss every inch of me….."

"Didn't I ? I seem to remember having a damn good try….."

"No, you didn't…you got….. distracted…"

"Well, in two years I must have….."

"Not in one go," she interrupted him, her eyes full of intent.

He rolled her over and sat up.

"Hmmm. Well, perhaps I'd better have another try…." he said, leaning over to kiss her neck.

She placed her palms on his chest to stop him.

"Actually, darling, I've got a better idea…" She sat up, drawing up her legs and twisting round to face him. She then leant back on her elbows, delicately extending one foot to push him away a little and wriggled her toes invitingly.

"Start with my feet this time…"


	6. Chapter 6 Manchester, Christmas Eve 1924

** A/N : Ok so this one is out of sequence, but I wanted to write it in time for Christmas so I'll just have to slot the other chapters around it as and when they get written ! **

* * *

Sybil Branson felt herself start to surface from a deep, contented sleep. She was as warm as toast, wrapped as she was by the eiderdown and Tom's body, his arm pulling her close. But something was wrong. As she came to, she became aware of the feeling she was being watched. She opened her eyes cautiously, only to find it was still dark and that there was a small, chocolate-smeared face regarding her curiously from beyond the edge of the bed.

"Why aren't you wearing your nightie, Mama ?"

"Niamh ! What are you doing out of bed ? And where did you get that chocolate from ?"

She gathered the blanket to her hurriedly, lifting her head off the pillow and shrugging herself groggily onto an elbow.

"I wanted to see if Father Christmas has been yet."

Behind her, Tom stirred.

"Wassamatter ?" he said, blinking over his wife's shoulder. He took in his eldest daughter, letting out a groan when he noticed the clock by the bed.

"It's half past five. Go back to bed, sweetheart."

"But Father Christmas has been !"

Sybil frowned. They had left the children's stockings downstairs last night before they went to Midnight Mass, leaving Tom's mother to mind the children.

"How do you know, darling ?"

"My stocking !"

"Have you been downstairs, Niamh ?" her father asked her sternly.

She nodded enthusiastically.

"I went downstairs and my stocking's got _presents_ ! " she explained dramatically, her eyes wide with wonder

"Wait a minute," interrupted Sybil, "have you opened them ?"

Niamh shook her head.

"Too high" she explained.

"Then where did you get the chocolate ?"

"Off the tree"

Sybil sat up horrified, almost forgetting she was naked underneath the blanket. Niamh had nagged at both parents and her grandmother incessantly over the last week about wanting to eat the chocolates on their christmas tree. She's been repeatedly told she had to wait and they'd made sure they were out of her reach.

"How did you get them?"

"I climbed up"

"What ?!" Now Tom sat up bolt upright. "What did you climb on ?"

"A chair"

They looked at each other, their minds filled with all the terrible things that could have happened with a four year old balanced on a chair and a not-too-stable christmas tree full of glass ornaments. Sybil tucked the blankets under her arms and reached down to lift the little girl onto the bed.

"That was very, very naughty," she scolded, "we've told you before about climbing on things, especially when there isn't a grown-up there. You could have fallen and hurt yourself !"

Niamh looked at her mother, unrepentant.

"But I didn't," she stated simply, not understanding what all the fuss was about.

"That's not the point," her mother said, "you've been told not to do it. Now tell us you're sorry and you must promise to not do it again."

Niamh squirmed in her lap.

"Sorry," she whispered reluctantly.

"And we told you not to go downstairs at night," said Tom

Niamh shrank into her mothers arms.

"Sorry," she whimpered again, her face crumpling. A true Daddy's girl, she hated it when he told her off.

"Hush, there, no harm done," said Sybil, hugging her a little closer, "…not _this_ time, anyway, but just don't do it again…."

But it was too late and Niamh was bawling in her lap.

"Oh darling, don't cry ! Its Christmas !"

"I'm sorry, Mama !" Niamh wailed again.

"Oh sweetheart, I know you are," she kissed the top of her head, "and you're tired as well, aren't you ?"

Niamh nodded, rubbing her eyes and sniffing loudly.

"Why don't you go back to bed and wait for the morning. Then you can open your presents and see what Father Christmas has brought you."

She could hear Tom rummaging for his pyjama trousers beside her, struggling to pull them on under the covers.

"Come on, poppet, lets wipe your face and take you back to bed, otherwise you'll wake your Grandma" he said, swinging out of bed, "and we don't want _that_," he muttered. Niamh clambered over Sybil's legs and let him pick her up in one arm.

"Will he take them away ?" Sybil heard her ask, as he carried her out of the door.

"What, darling ?"

"My presents. Will Father Christmas come and take them away because I was naughty ?"

She could almost hear Tom smiling.

"Well, I don't know," he said seriously, "I think it all depends on whether you're a good girl now and go back to sleep. You'll have to wait and see."

Sybil gasped and shook her head. It seemed to have done the trick, though, as she saw a now clean-faced Niamh scuttle back to her bedroom, followed by her father. Five minutes later he was back.

"Tom, that was awful ! What happened to being honest with our children ?"

He looked at her incredulously.

"Exactly what part of telling her that her presents are bought by an old man who comes on a sleigh pulled by flying reindeer is honest ?" he asked.

"That's different. Everyone tells children that. Didn't you believe in Father Christmas as a child ?"

"Kieran told me Father Christmas didn't exist when I was six."

"And weren't you upset ?"

"Not really," he said, smiling a little ruefully as he climbed back into bed, "Father Christmas wasn't exactly generous in our part of the world. And as long as there was something in my stocking I didn't care whether it came from Mam and Pa or from some old man coming down the chimney."

Sybil couldn't help but sigh rather sadly, realising once again the difference in their childhoods. Christmas for her had always been a magical time - a time of good natured indulgence and wonder that seemed to go on for days, of longed for wishes fulfilled, new dolls, dresses and the excitement of being allowed to help themselves at a lunch without servants. It was sobering to remember that Tom had very different memories - Christmas for the Bransons whilst wonderful in its own way, had been a short interval of small treats, just a pause in a life of hard work. She settled under the blankets and turned to face him, thinking again that what really made her realise she had forged her own life was the fact that her children's memories of childhood were going to be very different to her own. It made her feel regretful and hopeful at the same time.

"You must have thought us terribly extravagant at Christmas," she said, feeling a little guilty.

"Not really," he said, turning to her and brushing away a stray curl that threatened to fall across her face. "Your parents were always very generous to the staff at Christmas. And they loved you, so they wanted to make Christmas special for you, just as my parents did. Its just that what was special for you was different to what was special for me. But in the end, what was really special was the same for both of us - that we had our family, and that our parents loved us. And that's what we'll give to Niamh and her sister."

He kissed her on her forehead, where she had started to frown at the mention of her errant daughter.

"I know she's been naughty, Tom, but I really don't think you should tease her like that…."

He smirked.

"She'll live. And anyway,", he said as he burrowed back under the blankets, "we won't hear a peep out of her now for at least another two hours. We can go back to sleep…..…."

Sybil looked up, catching the doubt in his voice. He was grinning at her mischievously and wrapping an arm around her waist.

"…unless, of course, my darling wife would like an early Christmas present…."

"Go to sleep, Tom"


	7. Downton, December 1921 Going Home Part I

**A/N:** This chapter and the next one were originally one chapter, but it got a bit long./This chapter and the next one were originally one chapter, but it got a bit long, so I split it in two...

* * *

He was late, terribly late, but if he ran he might just get the last train from Lime Street station, meaning he could be back at Downton by midnight. He hammered up the stairs from the tram stop, bags in hand, to see the train at the platform with a full head of steam. All the doors were closed and the conductor had raised his flag and had the whistle in his mouth. Tom was tired, depressed and the thought of spending the night in Liverpool in a dingy hotel room rather than with his wife and daughter was too much - he pushed his weary limbs into one final effort, barged through the platform barrier, ignoring the shouts of the ticket collector as he sprinted along the platform to the second class carriages and grabbed a door handle just as the train started to move. He wrenched the door open with all of his might, threw his bags in haphazardly and hauled himself into the train with the protests of the conductor ringing in his ears. He stood in the corridor bent double, trying to get his breath, then picked up his bags and tried to find an empty compartment. In the end he found one with only one other occupant, a skinny, sour looking clergyman, so he gave the man a nod and stowed his bags in the netting overhead, shrugged off his overcoat and collapsed gratefully on the seat by the window.

He felt as if he had hardly seen Sybil all month. He'd spend much of November and the first week of December in London tracking the progress of the treaty talks, trying and eventually succeeding in securing an interview with Robert Barton. Barton's father was a wealthy english scholar and was, Tom reasoned, the member of the treaty delegation least likely to question his republican credentials, writing for an English newspaper and married to an aristocrat. He spent long nights in his draughty hotel room writing up his dispatches and wiring them off to his Manchester office in time for the morning edition. After the treaty was signed he had a few days back in Manchester, during which his wife excitedly told him that they were to be parents again. Before he even had time for this news to sink in properly, he was on the boat to Dublin to spend another two week covering the treaty debates in the Dáil. He would be making the return trip in a few days, but this time with his wife and daughter as they were expected at his mother's for Christmas. Sybil had suggested it would be easier if he stayed in Dublin whilst she brought Niamh over on her own, but he insisted on coming back. He was not going let her deal with an active toddler on a long journey on her own. That, and the fact that he was missing her terribly.

Once the truce brought a cessation to the fighting in the summer, he and Sybil had talked about going back to Ireland. They'd only been in Manchester six months and were just starting to feel a little settled for the first time since leaving Dublin. Tom was wary of making a decision too quickly, knowing full well that the truce was an uneasy one and the British were unlikely to have changed their views of the republican press. As time went on, it became apparent that both sides in the conflict seemed to view the truce as merely a break in the fighting, a time to rearm and entrench their positions. It was a truce that no-one expected to last. They'd decided to see the year out in England and then see where things stood at Christmas.

It had been a miserable fortnight in Dublin. It was evident from the increasingly acrimonious turn that the debates were taking that the fledgeling administration was already becoming increasingly polarised. De Valera hated the treaty as a compromise he had no hand in, whilst increasingly vitriolic attacks were being launched on Collins for being bullied by Lloyd George into accepting an agreement that left Ireland free of neither the British King nor of British troops. Now that the common cause of fighting the British Government was no longer there, Tom watched the nascent Irish Free State start to fracture in front of his eyes. It could only be a matter of time before they turned on each other.

The weeks away had left him feeling unsettled. His work at the paper had sent him back to Dublin several times over the course of the year, and each time he was reminded how much he missed hearing people around him speak the same way he did, of not being conscious of sounding foreign every time he opened his mouth. No matter how long he had been away, it was not just that the city felt so familiar to him that made him feel comfortable; it was that these places remembered him. These were the streets and the faces that had watched him grow to manhood, and as such he felt their indulgence in a way that he couldn't at Downton or Manchester.

It made him think of his own daughter, especially as Niamh was growing up. At eighteen months, she was beginning to talk - and she sounded like her mother. Sybil had acquired enough of an accent to pronouce place names correctly and had picked up a few vernacular phrases, but you would only know she had lived in Ireland if you listened very carefully. And even that was going. He tried hard to tell his daughter tales from his boyhood, sing her lullabies his mother had sung to him, but he was beginning to realise that her childhood was destined to be very different to his in ways he had not even considered. He wanted to give her a taste of Iiving in Ireland before it was too late. If the treaty was ratified, Tom couldn't help but think that the arguments in the Dáil would list slowly into open conflict. A civil war was no place for a pregnant woman and a small child. Whilst he desperately wanted to be part of Ireland's future, he needed his family. He sighed and stared out of the window as the train rocked its way east, the harsh light of the carriage allowing him to see nothing but blackness outside.

He'd telephoned from Liverpool to tell them he would get a taxi when he arrived. When it pulled up to the house the lower floors were in darkness, but one of the great doors was open and a small lamp glowed inside. He paid off the cabbie and was greeted by Carson and Alfred. He felt a small pang of guilt that he was keeping them up.

"Good Evening, Mr Branson. The family have all gone to bed, but Lady Sybil asked that some sandwiches be left for you in the library."

He thanked Carson, handing over his luggage and headed over to the library, suddenly realising that he was hungry. He smiled gratefully at his wife's forethought and sat down and ate whilst idly picking up Robert's Telegraph. The leader was about the Irish treaty. The editor seemed to be making the point that it was in Ireland's best interest to remain divided, and the Irish delegation had made a sensible decision. In London's best interests, he thought in disgust, chewing on the sandwich. The threw the paper down in annoyance and drained his tea - he was tired and he wanted his bed.

He noticed slivers of light underneath the doors of several family bedrooms, meaning they had not long retired, but his and Sybil's room was in darkness. He could hear her regular breathing as he slipped through the door, a sure sign that she was fast asleep. She must have gone to bed early. He felt a small stab of disappointment - he'd more than half expected her to wait up for him. He slipped off his jacket and shoes and loosened his tie, then sat on the bed, leaning over her. She was curled on her side, a furious frown on her face and her mouth slightly open. He smiled at her with great fondness, just the sight of her able to make the miserable weeks slip from his mind. A tendril of hair was threatening to fall across her face. He moved it gently with his fingertips and leant over to kiss her forehead. She didn't move. She looked so delicate, curled up like this, that he was forcefully reminded of just how much he had missed her when he was stuck in that lonely hotel room. He needed to hear her voice. He stroked her cheek tenderly and one kiss to her brow became another to her cheek, then her nose, and finally her mouth. She began to stir. He continued dropping light kisses over her face until she rolled away from him onto her back and opened her eyes, blinking at him. He smiled at her.

"Hello"

She seemed still half asleep.

"What time is it ?"

"Nearly midnight"

She groaned.

"I've only been asleep for a few hours"

She sounded tired and more the a little irritated. His smile faded.

"I thought you'd be pleased to see me"

She peered at him, trying to open her eyes fully, but it seemed a huge effort.

"I am."

"You could have fooled me," he grumbled.

'You woke me up"

"Well, I'm sorry," he huffed, turning his back on her and starting to undress.

She gave another groan, turning back over and closing her eyes.

"Tom, please, I'm so tired…"

"So am I" he muttered, "I've been working fourteen hour days for the last two weeks and when I wasn't I was stuck on my own in that awful hotel. I missed you terribly and I thought you would have…." he turned and looked back at her over his shoulder.

Sybil had gone back to sleep.

A felt a small stab of resentment as he pulled on his pyjamas and slipped into bed beside her. Normally they would have curled around each other with her head on his chest, but he left her where she was and lay on his back looking at the ceiling, eventually falling asleep, his body exhausted with fatigue and disappointment.

He awoke sharply from a deep sleep. It was still dark and it took him a few seconds to realise he was neither in the hotel, nor back at home, but in their bed at Downton. Before he could even wonder what had woken him, he heard it - the unmistakable sound of retching. The bed beside him was empty, the eiderdown and blankets hastily thrown back. He dropped his head back on the pillow - morning sickness. He was still smarting from last night's disappointment, so he rolled over on his back and closed his eyes again. Another bout of retching came from the bathroom, trailing off feebly, as if whoever it was was expelling their strength along with the vomit. It was followed by a bout of coughing. He sighed, and throwing off the blankets, padded barefoot into the bathroom.

She was sprawled on the floor hugging the toilet bowl, her forehead resting on the cool ceramic of the rim. Under the naked bathroom light he was shocked to see a ridge of vertebrae rising out at the top of her nightgown and her shoulder blades clearly visible through the thin material. Even her arms looked thinner. He sank to the floor facing her and rested his back against the tiles.

"How long have you been being sick ?"

She lifted her head gingerly and turned to look at him. Her eyes were dull and the skin underneath them dark.

"Since last week. It's been….."

She was interrupted by another bout of dry retching, producing nothing but spittle. He got up, dampened a facecloth and handed it to her so she could wipe her mouth.

"You've lost weight"

"I can't seem to keep anything down,"

He sighed.

"Why didn't you tell me, Sybil ?"

"You were busy."

She winced - it sounded accusatory even to herself. She hadn't mean it to come out like that. She saw him stiffen and his mouth disappear to a thin line.

"I would have come back if I'd known you were like this"

"There was no need. You couldn't have done anything anyway."

He was not reassured by being reminded of his uselessness in the business of carrying their child. She could see him biting back a retort.

"Nevertheless, I should have been here" he said with a little asperity.

She shook her head, and immediately wished she hadn't as another wave of nausea hit. She closed her eyes and sat perfectly still, breathing shallowly and waiting for it to pass. A single tear collected in the corner of her eye and made its way over her cheekbone.

"I'm sorry," she whispered, "I didn't mean it like that. I didn't want you to rush back…." She turned her head again to look at him, her eyes shining hopelessly. "I'm just so tired,Tom, I can't even….."

"Hey, hey, hush now," he said, shuffling forward and stroking her head like a small child, "there must be something we can do. We'll get Dr Clarkson to come over…."

"He's been," she said blankly, "he says I just have to try and keep fluids down and that it will pass in a few weeks."

He put his arm around her waist to pull her close to him.

"Good God, Sybil, will you look at you - you're skin and bones ! Surely he must be able to….."

But she shook her head. "It's a good sign apparently. It means the baby is strong."

"You weren't like this with Niamh"

"Not as bad, no"

He sighed, holding her a little closer, but gently, as if worried he would hurt her.

"I wish you'd told me, love. I hate to think of you being so ill and me not there…."

"I wasn't on my own. Everyone has been very kind, and at least there was someone to look after Niamh…..Ohhhhhhh….."

She sat up and put her hand over her mouth.

"Are you going to be sick again ?"

For answer she launched herself at the toilet bowl and hung her head over, breathing heavily. After a few minutes without retching, she shook her head.

"No. I think I'll be alright in a minute."

He started to run his hand up and down her back slowly, rubbing gently. It made her smile.

"That feels nice."

"Do you think you can go back to bed ?"

She nodded and he stood, moving to the washbasin to fill a glass with water. She took it gratefully and swilled her mouth to get rid of the acrid taste of sick. He offered her a hand, which she took.

"Up you come."

She was a little unsteady on her feet, so he put an arm around her and guided her back to the bed, sitting her down and helping her swing her feet back under the blankets. He poured her some water.

"Do you think you can keep this down ?"

"I think so"

She sipped cautiously, letting the clean water clear the last of the vile taste in her mouth, swallowing gingerly and wincing a little as the cold water hit her stomach. Tom watched her carefully, taking the glass when she had finished and then sliding in next to her. She was asleep again within minutes.


	8. Downton, December 1921 Going Home Part 2

**A/N: **Reposting this chapter as I noticed a bunch of edits were missing ! Thanks to everyone who is still reading !

* * *

She was still fast asleep when he got up a few hours later. He dressed quietly and shooed away the maid who had brought up tea, before going downstairs for breakfast. To his surprise, Cora had joined Robert and Matthew in the dining room. She looked up and smiled at him.

"Tom - you made it home last night. Sybil wasn't sure if you'd be in time for the train."

"Yes," he said, giving her a small smile, "I just caught the last one." He paused, glancing away from her. "Sybil was asleep when I got back"

"She went to bed early last night. The baby's making her tired."

"And sick" he added, significantly.

"Ah," Cora said, seeing he was none to pleased at being kept in the dark about Sybil's condition, "she didn't want to worry you, not when….."

"Did no one think to tell me ?" he interrupted, putting his knife and fork down. "She's practically a walking skeleton !"

Cora exchanged an uncomfortable glance with her husband.

"We all wanted to, but she was adamant you weren't to be disturbed" said Matthew, trying smooth things over.

"There wasn't anything you could have done," added Robert, "Dr Clarkson said all she could do was rest and try and drink plenty."

"Which we have been making sure she does," added Cora. "but Sybil knew how important this was to you and she wanted you to be able to do your job without worrying about her"

"Nothing is more important than she is," he said stubbornly.

"We know, Tom," said his mother-in-law sympathetically, "but you also know how determined Sybil is. She would have been very upset if we'd called you back"

He sighed, giving her a small nod. He did indeed know how stubborn his wife could be. "When did she see Dr Clarkson last ? Is there really nothing we can do ?"

"He's been looking in on her every day," said Cora, trying to be reassuring. "He's keeping an eye on her."

"How bad has she been ?"

Robert opened his mouth to answer, but was silenced by a look from Cora. Tom wanted the truth, not to be fobbed off with a vague lie, supposedly for his own good.

"She's been feeling sick most of the day. She hasn't been able to keep anything down for over a week now. Its making her very tired so she has been sleeping a lot."

"I'll speak to Dr Clarkson when he comes. There must be something he can give her….."

Robert put down his teacup.

"Apparently not, otherwise he would have given it to her already."

"I know its a shock and you're worried, Tom, but we really do just have to let her rest and wait till it stops. She's strong, she will be alright."

Tom stared at his breakfast bleakly. He could see everyone had been trying to do their best for her, and that it was Sybil herself who had kept him in the dark. But he still felt upset that she had chosen to bear this alone and had not wanted him with her when she was suffering.

After breakfast he went back upstairs to see her. She was awake and sitting up in bed, sipping a cup of tea. She still looked pale and drawn, but she seemed to be able to tolerate the tea and had not been sick again.

"I'll get up in a minute and go to the nursery. I hardly saw Niamh yesterday."

"No - you stay in bed. I'll go and get her and bring her down here."

* * *

Niamh was sat at the breakfast table in the nursery, chattering away to Nanny whilst she was occupied with trying to feed baby Robert.

"Daddy ! Daddy !" she screamed at the top of her voice, dropping her spoon and sliding off the chair to run to her father, arms outstretched. Tom couldn't help but smile as he swung her up, holding her tight and tickling her.

"How's my little girl been ? Did you miss me ?"

She giggled in delight.

"Yes !"

"Give me a kiss, then"

She was only too willing to oblige.

"Ugh, Niamh, you're all sticky !"

She laughed again, placing her hands on either side of his face. He peeled them off, inspecting them and pulling a face.

"Look at you, you mucky pup - shall we clean you up before we go and see Mama ?"

"Mama poorly" she informed him.

"Yes, I know, darling. We'll go and cheer her up a bit - but you have to be a good girl and be quiet for Mama - no screaming…."

He waved Nanny away and went to get a cloth to wipe her face and hands, as well as trying to get porridge off his suit jacket. All clean, he picked her up whilst she continued to chatter away and carried her downstairs.

Niamh was overjoyed to see her mother and was scrabbling down from his arms to get to Sybil before he had a chance to drop her on the bed properly. She was, however, also quite unable to sit still for more that a few minutes, so after a quarter of an hour Sybil's small reserve of energy had been exhausted and he could see she was struggling. He picked Niamh off the bed and took her by the hand, leading her out of the door.

"Let's go and leave Mama in peace, sweetheart. Take you back to Nanny…wave bye-bye to Mama….."

Once on the landing she broke away from him, running along the corridor on sturdy little legs. She stopped suddenly, turning and standing on tip toes to peer comically into an open door. With an excited squeal she suddenly darted into the room.

"Niamh !" he hissed. "Come out of there !"

He reached the doorway to find Cora with her in her arms and Mrs Hughes smiling at her broadly.

"I'm sorry, Lady Grantham, she got away from me."

Cora smiled, apparently unconcerned by her granddaughter's invasion.

"Thank you, Mrs Hughes, I think we've covered everything. We can go through the other rooms tomorrow." She turned to her son-in-law.

"How's Sybil ?" she asked. "I've not had a chance to go and see her yet."

"Very tired. Fifteen minutes with Niamh exhausted her."

"You can't ask Sybil to travel to Ireland for Christmas, Tom. She won't be well enough."

He sighed,

"I know. I'll have to write to my mother today and tell her we're not coming."

"I know you both wanted to go, but there'll be other times," said Cora kindly. "Perhaps you can go in the New Year. Sybil is bound to be stronger by then."

His silence made her think he wasn't convinced.

"I hope so - I hate it when the baby makes her sick. I feel so useless…" he shoved his hands in his pockets.

"Sybil won't admit it, but I suspect she'll feel better now you're back," she smiled. "How did you get on in Dublin ? I didn't get a chance to ask you at breakfast."

"It was busy," he said, "a lot of late nights. I was very glad to get back"

"You must be pleased that the treaty finally has been signed."

He glanced up at her wearily.

"Not really."

"But won't it mean you and Sybil can go back to Ireland ?"

"I don't know," he said honestly. "The treaty isn't going down very well with a lot of people. It's yet to be ratified. And even if it is…."

"What do you mean ?"

"Let's just say its likely the fighting isn't over yet" he said bluntly.

Cora looked shocked

"Surely not ?"

He nodded grimly.

"That's what I'm afraid of"

She paused, letting this sink in.

"You wouldn't take Sybil and Niamh back if it wasn't safe for them, would you ?"

"No, of course not."

Cora studied him. He too, looked tired and rather subdued. She didn't profess to understand the intricacies Irish politics so she didn't press him any further, instead letting a bored Niamh struggle down out of her arms. They both watched the toddler as she started to explore the empty bedroom, talking to herself.

"She's growing up so fast," said Cora, "it won't be long now before she'll be chattering away…."

"By the time its safe for us to move back to Ireland, she'll sound like Sybil….." he said sadly, "she'll already be an English little girl…"

"I do know what its like," she said quietly, placing a gentle hand on his arm.

"What do you mean ?"

"To watch your children grow up sounding different to you. For them to learn different stories, different traditions from the ones you grew up with….no-one can make you feel more of an outsider than your own children"

Tom looked at her, surprised. Lady Grantham had always seemed so much a part of this place that it had never occurred to him that she felt that way. Sybil had always seemed entirely English to him - he had forgotten she was, in fact, half American.

"Do you miss America ?" he asked, intrigued despite himself.

"Oh, not now. I've lived in England much longer than I ever lived in the States. Downton is home. But I do wish the girls were more…_American_. Sometimes I see it in Sybil, but not the other two. She's only been once - to New York, when she was twelve. I doubt she remembers a lot about it. America to her is somewhere exotic. I can understand you not wanting that for Niamh. But you have the advantage that Ireland is a lot closer than America."

Tom reached out and took his daughter's hand gently in his, steering it away from the expensive-looking vase she was reaching for on the desk beside him, meeting her frustrated gaze with a shake of his head.

"Maybe, but if there's a civil war, it might as well be the other side of the ocean. Then God knows how long it will be before its safe for us go to back…." he trailed off despondently.

"But your family will come and visit ?"

"They will, but they can't really afford…." he stopped, not wanting to discuss his family's precarious finances with his mother-in-law. "They can't come as often as we'd like them to," he said, "and its not the same. I want Niamh to see that there is somewhere where _everyone _sounds like I do. And I want her to know where I grew up and where her Irish family live. I want Ireland to be a part of her so she that feel she belongs there - and for her to be a part of Ireland, too."

"Does that mean you don't want her to feel that she belongs here ?" asked Cora, with a little edge to her voice.

Tom looked at her with a steady gaze.

"No. Whatever I might feel about myself, I don't want that for her. I want her to feel at home wherever she is. Whether its at Downton or in Dublin."

"But you don't want to feel that you belong here."

"It's not a question of whether I want to or not - I don't. That's just a matter of fact."

"Well, I for one am very sorry for that" Cora sounded genuinely saddened by what he had said.

Tom shifted uncomfortably. Lady Grantham had always made him feel welcome at Downton - but, well meant though it was, her warmth and generosity couldn't disguise what he knew in his heart. He didn't belong here. He never would. At best, he would be tolerated as an object of curiosity, much like some of the strange curios brought back from the Grand Tour by previous incumbants.

"You've been very generous to me, Lady Grantham, and I'm grateful for that. But I don't think Lord Grantham will ever quite forget that I was once his chauffeur. I just hope he can forget Niamh is the chauffeur's daughter."

"Robert loves Niamh, Tom. Sometimes I think you are a little hard on him. Give him some credit."

Tom gave a small smile in apology and nodded.

"Yes - yes, I know he does."

"You are our granddaughter's father, and hence you are part of this family. I want you to feel that whatever happens you and Sybil have a home here if you need it."

"Even if my wild ideas make your daughter and grandchildren destitute ?" he smiled. Cora grinned back at him.

"Much as Robert hates the idea, I think Sybil would be happier destitute with you than cooped up on an estate with someone he approved of," she said.

"I very much hope it won't come to that, Lady Grantham."

"I'm sure it won't," she smiled.

* * *

He was surprised when Sybil appeared after lunch, feeling a little brighter and able to see Dr Clarkson in the library when he came. She managed to keep down a little soup and some of the colour had returned to her cheeks. Tom felt disinclined to work, so in the afternoon they retired to the quiet of the library whilst Niamh had her nap. They sat next to each other on one of the red sofas, Tom's hand resting comfortably on her knee whilst they read peaceably.

Sybil suddenly put her book down and settled back into the sofa, taking deep breaths.

"Are you alright ?" he asked, concerned

"Reading's making me feel sick again. I just needed to stop," she said, placing her hand over his reassuringly. "I'll be fine. And I need to go and see Niamh. It will be teatime soon."

"Promise me you won't wear yourself out…." She opened her mouth to assure him she wouldn't, but he interrupted her, squeezing her fingers. "And _promise_ me the next time you are sick when I'm not here, you'll tell me."

"I didn't want you to come back just for my sake," she said

"It wasn't your decision to take alone, love. It's not how we do things. Don't shut me out."

"I didn't mean to shut you out. I know how important these debates are and….."

"Nothing is more important to me that you are" he said, his wide blue eyes blazing. "If you're sick, then I want to know about it."

She squeezed his hand in response and gave him a small nod, but she was unable to look at him, humbled by his words and the ferocity with which he had said them.

"Alright," she said quietly, looking up to meet his gaze. The sat in the late afternoon gloom, silently making a promise to each other.

Finally he put the book he had been reading face down next to him, the pages spread and a crease forming along the spine, a habit that made his father-in-law wince. Sybil automatically picked up the book and closed it properly.

"I'm sorry about Christmas, Tom. I know how much you were looking forward to taking Niamh over."

"It can't be helped, love. You're not fit to travel"

"Will you be able to get more time off ?"

"I'll need to be back in Dublin anyway for the vote."

"What will happen if the Dáil don't ratify the treaty ?"

He gave a short laugh.

"Lloyd George made that pretty clear. The British will resume hostilities."

"And if they do ?"

He shook his head.

"The treaty is causing so much bitterness. The likes of Cathal Brugha and Erskine Childers won't accept it. Collins even joked he'd signed his own death warrant."

"So they'll be more fighting, whichever way the Dáil votes ?"

"It looks like it."

Sybil studied the carpet for a while, both hands gripping the edge of the seat.

"We're not going back to Ireland in the near future, are we ?"

He looked down and shook his head, defeated.

She couldn't think of anything to say, so she reached over and took his hand in both of hers and laid her head on his shoulder.

"If you weren't married to me, you'd still be in Ireland,"

"If I wasn't married to you, I might still be a chauffeur." he reminded her.

"Do you really think so ?"

"Maybe. But I am married to you, and I'm not sorry for it"

"Even with leaving Ireland ?"

"Even with leaving Ireland. I'd do it all again, Sybil, in a heartbeat."

She breathed a sigh of relief and wormed her way insistently into his embrace.

"I'm so glad….."

They sat in silence for several minutes, nothing more to be said. After a while she shifted, and looked up.

"Look," she said, "its getting dark already. It's only just gone four o'clock."

"Today's the solstice - the shortest day of the year."

She got up and walked to the window. It had snowed heavily the night before and as in the dim light the snow-covered park looked completely flat, as if someone had drawn it on a sheet of pure white paper. As the dark seeped in from the edges and started rubbing out the detail from the scene, the expanse of white became luminous, reflecting the moon that was rising on the horizon.

"I hope things are different this time next year - I hope we're back in Dublin," she said.

"Everything will be different next year. We'll have two children, God willing," he reminded her.

"Yes." she nodded, "Next year will be very different."


End file.
